may i present to you the future of america

My Mom sent me the following e-mail and I of course must add in my own thoughts, because, well, that’s just what I do.

From: Lynn

To: Cassie

Subject: Why English Majors Die Young

You know I don’t typically forward stuff, but these are funny and the writer in you will appreciate them.

Every year English teachers from across the country can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays.

These excerpts are published each year to the amusement of teachers.

Here are last year’s winners…..

1. Her face was a perfect oval like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

Wow. I mean. Wow. However, I’m glad this kid even knew what a Thigh Master is and I’m sure Susanne Somers would be proud.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

Now, here is a prime example of how I’m positive his/her mother wouldn’t care about the terrible sentence. Instead, she’s probably so proud they know that you need dryer sheets to avoid cling.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

I can’t even begin on this one. This one here takes the whole damn cake and the little paper plates you put them on. (How’s that for a sentence?)

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

Now, the nurse in me is proud. This student knew how to spell E. Coli and that it grows on room temperature beef.

5. She had a deep throaty genuine laugh like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

My dog doesn’t really make a deep throaty sound before she barfs. Instead, she just kind of hacks. I think this student should have used hack…

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as like whatever.

Like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot three-inch tree.

Glad we cleared that one up.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

I hate those damn ATM surcharges. I mean, if I bank with you, why the hell are you charging me more money? This here sentence made it extremely clear as to how pissed he must have been.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie surreal quality like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. Instead of 7:30.

Well, I can say with complete certainty that there would be an unearthly howl from my Mom if they messed with her Jeopardy times. It’s the only show she looks forward to, damnit.

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

I’ve never fully investigated a nose hair after a sneeze, but I’m sure it would look rain slicked.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

What kind of cook IS this freak?

14. Long separated by cruel fate the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. Traveling at 55 mph the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. At a speed of 35 mph.

The answer is: They’ll meet in Terre Haute at midnight.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

They are big, white teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

Well, wow. I guess that could be a true statement. It’s a shame those hummingbirds didn’t meet.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant and she was the East River.

So she ended up sleeping with the fishes?

18. Even in his last years Granddad had a mind like a steel trap only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

Nice run-on, rusty sentence.

19. Shots rang out as shots are wont to do.

What?!?

20. The plan was simple like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil this plan just might work.

Phil is a simple man. I get it. So is he/she saying that this plan is not simple? I’m confused.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look the kind you get from not eating for a while.

Makes sense…I guess?

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck either but a real duck that was actually lame may be from stepping on a land mine or something.

Wouldn’t that just kill the duck? How about a duck that’s lame because it sat out in the sun too long or it was dropped on its head as a young duckling? No? That’s just the writer of that sentence?

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her like a dog at a fire hydrant.

You know, I got an instant visual on that one. So bravo.

24. It was an American tradition like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

In West Virginia, maybe. But I was thinking more along the lines of baseball.

25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke he thought he heard bells as if she were a garbage truck backing up.